The Talk
by jls62113
Summary: Rick and Michonne finally sit down and really get to know each other. Now that they are together, Rick needs to know more. Something specific, for a specific reason.


Rick and Michonne finally sit down and really get to know each other. Now that they are together, Rick needs to know more. Something specific, for a specific reason.

Rick and Michonne sat at the kitchen table enjoying a quiet breakfast alone. The children were invited to spend the weekend at the Hilltop with Maggie, so they jumped at the chance because times like this were rare.

"It sure is quiet." Michonne said playing with her eggs.

"We can always go pick the kids up early."

Michonne looked up at Rick.

"It's not that quiet." She said smiling. "I do miss them though."

"They've only been gone 2 hours." Rick said getting up to clear dishes from the table.

"That was nice of Maggie to come get the kids. What do you feel like doing today?" She said drinking down her glass of water.

"Why don't we talk?" Rick said leaning against the kitchen counter.

"Talk?"

"Yeah, it's where I say words to you, then you say words to me, heard of it?"

She tossed the kitchen towel at him, and then ducked when he tossed it back.

"Besides, there is a Michonne I know nothing about."

"You know a lot of things about me."

"How much time have we really had to get to know each other? For example, you're not from Georgia or Virginia, where were you born?"

"Detroit Michigan."

"I didn't know that."

She laughed.

"I see what you mean. This could be fun. Okay, where were you born?"

"You know where, you've been there."

"King County Georgia?"

"Born and raised. My turn."

He motioned with his head, and she got up and followed him into the living room, and they stretched out on the couch. She at one end, and he at the other.

"What were you before you were, well, you?"

She gave him a questioning smile.

"I was an attorney." She said nearly wincing.

"Really? Power suits and courtrooms…I can see that in you."

She laughed again. He looked at her with a proud smile that took her breath and smile away.

"I know you had to be good at it."

"And how would you know that?"

"You're good at everything you do."

"Not everything." She said recalling her failure at keeping her son alive.

Rick lifted one of her feet and laid it in his lap and started massaging it. He understood her comment and let that subject drop.

"That feels good." She said closing her eyes. "I didn't set out to be a lawyer, but I _was_ good at it, and it was exciting at first, then I was in it for the money, then it was for love. I met my boyfriend Mike in a courtroom."

"What side of the law was he on?" Rick said with just a hint of jealousy thinking of anyone else being close to her.

"He was a lawyer too." She said eyeing Rick. "Down boy."

Rick smiled, embarrassed at having been so obvious.

"A deputy sheriff and a lawyer." He said laughing.

"Well we met at a prison." They both laughed. "My turn." She said rubbing the top of his bare foot. "What hobbies did you have?"

He thought about it for a moment before answering.

"I collected guns, me and my dad." He said seriously.

Michonne could sense his fondness for his father because he said 'my dad,' just like Carl does.

"Did he give you the Colt?"

"Yes he did." He said remembering his father, and then pushing those memories from his mind. They had a way of making him feel incredibly sad, and almost hopeless. "Why didn't you marry Mike?"

She looked at him seriously.

"Mike thought marriage was a ridiculous institution."

"His words?"

"Yeah." She said looking out the window behind Rick.

"You wanted to get married?" He looked down at his hands massaging her feet.

"Yes I did. I got pregnant 3 months after Mike and I moved in together. When that happened, I thought for sure he would want to give us his name, but he didn't. He still felt marriage to be just a piece of paper with no meaning."

"Didn't you know this about him before? More importantly, did he know how you felt about it?"

"I told him, but he laughed and treated me like I had no idea what I wanted. We didn't have Andre yet. Babies change your life."

"Yeah they do." Rick said finally looking at Michonne.

"What made you get married?" She asked.

"Two reasons. I was in love, and Lori was pregnant with Carl."

"Where you happy about getting married?"

"I was twenty years old and scared to death. I started college, but quit after about 2 semesters to join the sheriff's department. My father was devastated, but when I told him why, he understood and helped us buy our house."

"Your father loved you very much."

"Yes he did. He was a much better father than I am. He always knew what to say. Sometimes when I try talking to Carl, he leaves me speechless."

"If life was the way it used to be, you would have time to say those things to Carl your father said to you. This is a different world Carl is growing up in, and you know how to survive in it, just like your father knew how to survive in the old world and teach you what you needed then. Don't sell yourself short. Carl and Judith are very fortunate to have you for their father, before the outbreak and now."

"We are fortunate to have you."

She had no response. Sometimes he could tell her how much he loved her without actually saying the words. It always took her breath away.

The way she looked at him, and the deep breath she took, he knew she got the message.

"Did you like being married? She asked finally.

"Yes. I thought I was a good husband, I did the best I could, but sometimes I didn't feel Lori was happy with me. It seems she would go out of her way to pick fights just to get a rise out of me, but that's not who I am, and that would piss her off." He looked at the ceiling thinking about the marriage he could not put back together before Lori died. "I've never felt the way I do right now about anyone. Since the first moment I saw you, I knew our meeting was for a reason, but I had no idea we would be this close."

"You didn't like me very much when you first saw me." She said.

"It wasn't that. I didn't trust you, and I was dealing with my own baggage. I was hallucinating and hearing phones ring." He finally looked up at Michonne and nearly forgot what he was about to say. "I had never seen anything like you. A lone survivor, and a female at that. A little wild, brave, strong and intense. You looked at me as if you had been looking for me. You scared me."

She wanted to smile, but he wasn't, so she didn't. He looked as if he were about to cry.

"Rick?" She said suddenly feeling as if the other shoe had dropped. "What's wrong?"

"The timing. This world is…"

"This world is what it is. Tomorrow it might be something else altogether different. I'll be here with you no matter what." Michonne struggled to understand why he was suddenly so serious.

He looked at her for a long time before he spoke.

"Michonne, am I enough for you?" He looked fractured somehow.

"What do you mean?" She picked up on his seriousness and it concerned her.

"I'm in love with you. I've known it for a long time, I just didn't understand what I was feeling. I had never felt this way before. When I had that meeting with the Governor, he asked me if you were worth the lives of everyone else at the prison. The first thought I had was yes, you were worth it, to me, but it wasn't just me I had to think about. You saved my life, you saved Carl from shutting down completely. If it hadn't been for you, I would still be hallucinating, dead for sure. When I told Carl about us, I told him that what you and I have is different than what I thought I wanted with Jessie, even different than I had with his mother. It is Michonne." He said gently grabbing her ankle with his hand to get her attention. "I never thought I would be with a woman like you who could make me feel the way you do." He smiled and gently squeezed her feet again. "I guess I should stop now, you got what I mean."

She smiled brightly and rubbed a hand over his shin.

"Yes, I got it, and yes you are enough for me Rick Grimes, more than enough, more than I deserve. When I found you and Carl in that abandoned house, I knew I never wanted to be without you again. Deanna asked me what I wanted for me, for the rest of my life, it took me a while to work up to it, but I've known for a long time that the answer to that question was you. I love you too."

He removed her feet from his lap and got up from the couch and knelt down beside her, leaned in and kissed her. They both smiled and he pulled out a piece of paper from his shirt pocket.

"Speaking of Deanna, Spencer found a note from Deanna that was addressed to me." He unfolded the letter, swallowed hard, and started to read it.

'Dear Rick, for a man like you, marriage would be a good thing, but only with the right woman. I told you I had a talent for reading people, and I know marriage suits you. You are a good man, a good father, and no doubt a good husband. I have no idea who you would have in mind, but from the way you look at her, my money is on Michonne.'

Michonne gasped and her hand flew to her mouth. Rick looked at her and then back down to the paper and continued reading it.

'The relationship the two of you have is special, and it is growing. I believed my husband and I were special in the same way, which is why I want you to have my wedding rings in the hope that you will follow your heart, and marry your heart's desire.'

He handed the letter to Michonne, but she didn't even look at it. She closed her eyes briefly recalling her friend who had helped her through a difficult time, and it brought tears to her eyes. She finally looked at Rick and smiled sadly.

"You are my heart's desire Michonne. My desire has always been to be with a woman who believed in me and what I could accomplish with her at my side. Michonne, that's you. Will you be my wife?"

She wrinkled her forehead and he looked crushed. Then it dawned on him what that look was all about, she was trying not to cry.

"I have been working up to asking you for weeks, but there was always something going on. I arranged for the children to be away this weekend because I wanted us to be alone when I proposed."

She smiled and he felt relieved.

"You planned all this?" She said smiling.

"All of it, and I didn't want to jump off this cliff without knowing you would be down there. I wanted to know why you hadn't been married. I thought you living with your boyfriend was your idea. I had to know how you felt about marriage before I asked you."

He got serious again. He looked into her eyes, then down at their holding hands, and then back up to her eyes.

"What you think and how you feel is very important to me. There is no other opinion I regard higher than yours, in everything."

"You know you could have started with 'I'm in love with you,' and ended with will you be my wife." Michonne started giggling at the puzzled look on his face.

"I went through all that for nothing? I could have just cut right to the chase?"

Her giggling stopped and turned into a sweet smile.

"It wasn't totally for nothing…yes Rick, I'll marry you."

He put his hands around her neck as if to strangle her. They both burst into laughter.

He wrapped her in his arms and the laughter stopped. They held each other and he kissed the side of her head.

"Thank you." He said his voice almost a whisper. "You still scare me Michonne, and with you and me that's a good thing." 


End file.
